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Dan Tamulonis
Mrs. Pisani-Babich
English 137H
14 October 2013
The Oil Spill: A (Rhetorical) Disaster
Rhetoric used by the British Petroleum Corporation (BP) in a recent newspaper
advertisement about ongoing issues with the massive oil spill of April 20, 2010 contrasts
with two radically different uses of rhetoric earlier in the spill situation. It is interesting to
see how this giant corporation floundered, caught itself, and now keeps changing its
message and methods as the situation evolves.
The oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico off the Louisiana coast killed 11 workers and
led to the release of between 2.45 million and 4.9 million gallons of oil. BP provided the
lower estimate; the federal government made the higher estimate. It took 87 days to cap
the well, and it turned into the largest offshore oil spill in U.S. history (Kraus). Every day
until the burning well was capped, graphic photographs ran in all kinds of media showing
the spreading oil and its effects on animals, beaches, wetlands, and fishermen. Not only
was it an environmental and economic disaster for the Gulf Coast, it was a public
relations disaster for BP, which uses a logo that is a combination of the sun and green
leaves.
While any individual or company could be expected to flounder at the beginning
of a crisis, BP, and specifically its CEO Tony Hayward, used rhetoric so poorly that their
thoughtless approach worsened the situation and set the stage for the media to paint BP as
an even greater villain. In the first few days, BP was secretive and inaccurate in giving
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out information on the severity of the situation and was very free in casting blame on
everyone but itself. Mr. Hayward was quoted as asking “What the hell did we do to
deserve this?” In spite of searing photographs of the spread of the oil, he also completely
missed the point by minimizing the spill and announcing that “The Gulf of Mexico is a
very big ocean. The amount of volume of oil and dispersant we are putting into it is tiny
in relation to the total water volume.” (Fletcher).
BP’s initial position of denial reads as the opposite of effective rhetoric. Because
BP quickly destroyed its own credibility by seeming not to understand the scope of the
disaster, BP did not demonstrate ethos. The company’s poor use of logos relates to its
lack of ethos: by providing too little information, and by issuing false information, BP
essentially allowed others, including the media, to step in and substitute other stories for
the one that BP tried to push. Although BP seemed to expect that the public might feel
some sympathy for it, the company probably never had a chance to use pathos, since the
public’s immediate empathy went to the victims and the environment. BP forgot the most
important aspect of their situation: the public sympathizes with themselves, not
corporations. The public protects their own people first, especially before a foreign oil
company. Mr. Hayward’s clumsy statements, including saying “I want my life back,”
only worsened the public’s anger toward the company. BP’s initial response of cover-up
enraged the victims’ families. Its dishonest approach and its failure to use persuasive
rhetoric caused tremendous public resentment. The situation led to a huge drop in the
company’s stock price and to the end of Mr. Hayward’s job.
After blundering so badly in its first response to the spill, BP’s second use of
rhetoric was careful and polished. In 2012, BP agreed to a multi-billion dollar settlement
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meant to clean up the oil and compensate victims. At this point, BP held the position of
one of the most hated companies in America, and they realized that they had to turn
around public opinion. After the cleanup and payouts began, BP started a charm
offensive and ran video and print ads in many media outlets talking about their
commitment to cleaning up the environment and to helping the people who had been
harmed economically by the spill (Phipper2011). BP’s public relations campaign was
intended to persuade Americans that the region has recovered.
The campaign’s use of rhetoric, however, caused some skepticism. The ads did
feature beautiful and appealing visual images, including children playing on clean
beaches, happy shrimp fishermen heading out on their boats, and people eating seafood at
outdoor restaurants. The company’s earlier poor response to the spill had damaged its
ethos, however. Many people still think of BP as the wolf in sheep’s clothing, and few
people are willing to take the company’s word that the gulf has recovered. The ads also
made no use of logos, or facts and statistics that might have proved that the millions of
gallons of oil on the bottom of the gulf were not doing damage, or that all the fishermen
and tourist interests that had been harmed were back on track. The rosy pictures
combined with the lack of solid information seem to suggest a surface treatment only and
actually worked against ethos and logos. In terms of pathos, the ads just remind us of the
hundreds of previous images of the spill and destruction it caused to lives and the
environment. We easily link these pretty new pictures with the earlier stark pictures by
photo-journalists. Just as with the spill, our empathy still goes to the victims, and not to
BP.
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In BP’s third use of rhetoric, the company again takes a completely new
approach. Everything changed this year when the court-appointed administrator began to
award settlement money from BP in ways that were going to cost the company billions
more than it had agreed to. The company claims that millions are being paid out to scores
of lawyers and individuals and businesses that did not experience any loss from the
effects of the spill, and that the administrator failed to do a good job documenting the
damage and the need for payments. This situation led to the advertisement that ran
recently in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post. The current
ad poses an interesting contrast to the rhetoric used in both of the previous approaches
taken by BP: first the denials, then the celebration of what they called a recovery. This
time the ad targets BP’s stockholders, politicians, and opinion-makers, all of whom have
tremendous influence, and even the courts themselves. BP needed to convince these
audiences that it knows what it is talking about, that it is telling the truth (this time), and
also to gain sympathy for its position so that the court might rein in the administrator.
Rhetorically, the third attempt at establishing itself as a credible company with an
important message works much more effectively than the previous two. This ad begins
with statistics showing how much BP already has paid out in settlements for the spill. “So
far, we’ve spent $14 billion on response and cleanup to help restore the environment.
We’ve also paid more than 300,000 claims totaling over $12 billion to help restore the
Gulf economy.” By using quantification, BP appears fact-based, in control, and
responsible. Using data is an effective way to establish logos. Better use of logos usually
results in a more effective ethos, and this ad successfully achieves that. BP goes on to
establish their credibility with the ad’s simple layout that uses text only. It is very
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professional looking, without any color, images or indented paragraphs. This serious
graphic style suggests a straightforward no-nonsense approach by the company, as
opposed to its past fluffy spin. It helps restore some of the company’s credibility because
it makes them appear as though they are handling their matters seriously and
professionally.
BP’s also uses pathos effectively for the first time. Reading through the full-page
advertisement, one can see that BP is trying to appear as the victim this time. They do not
take responsibility for the spill, but they do try to gain our respect by writing “Three
years ago BP made a commitment to the people of the Gulf...to ensure that people who
suffered losses from the accident would keep being paid.” The plain language of the ad
reads in a conversational way and makes the company seem less corporate and more
human and approachable. The ad uses warm words and phrases such as “good faith,” and
“helping as many deserving people as possible.” After the ad explains the current
complaint, again using plain language, BP uses one of the most effective tools of pathos:
seeking common agreement. It writes “Whatever you think about BP, we can all agree
that it’s wrong for anyone to take money they don’t deserve.” BP even puts itself in the
same camp as the victims of the spill by writing “And it’s unfair to everyone in the Gulf –
commercial fishermen, restaurant and hotel owners, and all the other hard-working
people who’ve filed legitimate claims.”
If BP had initially taken the stance that they do now, the anger and mistrust would
not have had a chance to grow to such great size. Because of the early floundering, the
public still has a hard time telling what BP’s true intentions are. Kairos, or the opportune
moment, went completely wrong. BP let the opportune moments pass time and time
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again. Although they made a skillful move in the end, their first stance toward the spill
put a damper on the chance of them fully restoring their image. Although their sincerity
in wanting a better settlement comes though convincingly in the latest ads, their image
took too big a hit to rebound regardless of how they approached this. Effective ethos,
logos, and pathos can only take an argument so far and timing can make or break a
campaign. Hopefully, other corporations have paid close attention to this situation and
will avoid making the same mistakes.
I am not the only one who thinks that BP’s rhetoric in this third attempt was
convincing. After I completed the first draft of this essay, BP got what it wanted from
the court, and put out this press release
Today's ruling affirms what BP has been saying since the beginning: claimants
should not be paid for fictitious or wholly non-existent losses. We are gratified
that the systematic payment of such claims by the claims administrator must now
come to an end. (BP Press Office)
It will be interesting to see where BP’s advertising goes in the future, and what rhetorical
devices it employs.
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Works Cited
"BP Advertisement." The New York Times [New York] 17 Sept. 2013: n. pag. Print.
BP Press Office. "BP Statement Re: Ruling by U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth
Circuit." BP. British Petroleum, 3 Oct. 2013. Web. 5 Oct. 2013.
<http://www.bp.com/en/global/corporate/press/press-releases/
bp-statement-re--ruling-by-u-s--court-of-appeals-for-the-fifth-c.html>.
Fletcher, Dan. "Quotes: BP CEO Tony Hayward on Gulf Oil Spill Read more:
http://newsfeed.time.com/2010/05/14/quotes-bp-ceo-tony-hayward-on-gulf-oilspill/ #ixzz2hfsEVJUy." Time 14 May 2010: n. pag. Time: NewsFeed. Web. 6
Oct.2013. <http://newsfeed.time.com/2010/05/14/ quotes-bp-ceo-tony-haywardon-gulf-oil-spill/>.
Kraus, Clifford. "In BP Trial, the Amount of Oil Lost Is at Issue." The New York
Times [New York] 29 Sept. 2013: n. pag. The New York Times. Web. 6 Oct.
2013. <http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/30/business/energy-environment/
bp-trial-in-2nd-phase-to-set-amount-of-oil-spilled.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0>.
New BP Commercial Promoting Tourism in Gulf Coast Region. By Phipper2011.
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YouTube. YouTube, 12 Dec. 2011. Web. 5 Oct. 2013.
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Q2tjWBIXEc>.
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